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Special Educational Needs and Disability (Support) Bill

That was an unsolicited tribute—something that one does not often expect to hear in our business. At a time when we are all held in quite the deepest imaginable public opprobrium, I can say only that I express heartfelt thanks to the hon. Gentleman; I appreciate his remarks. He and I work together across the party divide on many issues, of which this is one. I suspect that if we worked constructively and dispassionately, on a non-partisan basis, on more issues, more consistently and more often, we would, on the whole, be held in higher esteem by the mass of the electorate than currently we are. I should like to set the scene, establish the background and underline the rationale behind the introduction of my Bill. Let me put some fairly straightforward facts on the record. Twenty per cent. of children of school age have special educational needs or disability, and 7 per cent. of the sector are specifically disabled. What concerns me about this category of children and young people is the relative paucity of the outcomes that they are currently able to achieve in their settings. I do not want to subject my colleagues to a litany of statistics, but I will favour the House with just a sprinkling so that people listening to our debate can better understand the present plight and the need for improvement.